Hey everyone,
I’m planning to buy an FFL E04 Surge and I have a couple of questions before placing my order.
- Which driver should I choose — Lume1 or Lume X1?
I don’t care about complicated statistics too much, I’m mainly curious why I should choose one over the other and what real-world difference I can expect. I’ve seen a runtime graph for the Lume1, but I haven’t come across any for the Lume X1 yet — is one generally better for everyday use?
- Which emitter should I go with?
I’ll be honest, there are so many options and I’m a bit overwhelmed. I’m trying to decide between:
• Floody (wide spill)
• Throwy (long-distance beam)
• Balanced / in-between beam
What emitters do you all recommend for each of these styles on the E04 Surge?
- What tint / color temperature should I pick?
I haven’t used many warmer-tint lights before, so I’m not sure what K value to go with. I’m currently waiting on an Emisar D3AA 519A 5700K, so I might want something that pairs nicely with that.
Basically I just want to order the light, enjoy it, and not stress over choices too much.
Thanks in advance for your helps!
by tbeen_
4 Comments
Secret menu stf40 3000k. You can buy additional optics to swap between floody and throw. As for lume1 vs lumeX1 I have both and can’t say I notice much of a difference in either. If you want a more impressive turbo mode lume1 is your best bet, otherwise seems more of a wash
Well choose lume1 if you want maximum output for shorter periods of time. Choose X1 if you want slightly less output for longer periods of time and better battery management. For the others I think you need to pick what you want to use the light for and go from there.
Lower K (CCT) will be more yellowish and will result in less throw but better ability to distinguish the colors of whatever you are shining the light on.
Higher K (CCT) will be more white/bluish and will result in more light down range but will tend to whitewash things and make it harder to distinguish the colors of whatever you are looking at (especially up close). This phenomenon is described by the CRI or color rendering index – the higher the CRI the better your ability to distinguish distinct colors.
There aren’t a ton of emitters available on the FFL website and it does a pretty good job of explaining what you are getting if you know these basics.
It looks like the driver will determine your emitter choices, theoretically you could use 3V or 6V emitters with the lumex1 but I guess they only have a 4p MCPCB
Id probably go with sft40 with lume1 for balanced beam, lume1 and lumeX1 essentially have the same efficiency
The difference is lume1 is regulated up to 3V 6A but lumeX1 goes up to 6V 6A. 6A is more than it can sustain thermally anyway so you likely won’t notice in normal use. You will notice that the lume1 has a FET channel for higher max output than the lumeX1
AFAIK the driver doesnt matter much outside of turbo, as they are both fully regulated except that. The Lume1 has a FET turbo (very bright but gets hot quickly) while the X1 has a regulated turbo (boost driver), so it will be less bright, but can be sustained longer.